Regional Differences and Definitions

[Archivist13]

I find that so much of the whitetail hunting literature anymore is very focused on the Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio (midwest) general area. I have no problem with that being that are large percentage of the hunting whitetail hunting population is in that area. I actually grew up and hunt/hunted in NW PA since 1988 and always considered that part of the NE. I currently live and also hunt in Southern Maryland which I find is quite a bit different than hunting NW PA. I know whitetails everywhere are the same in theory, but the hunting of them is definitely different. My approach is definitely different back in the Allegheny National Forest compared to down here in the suburban/rural agricultural area of S. Maryland.

So, those of you that hunt different regions, do you find your approach is different in different regional areas? For any of you that are in the Mid Atlantic region, do you consider yourself part of the NE, South, something different? It seems like the Maryland/Virginia area is a bit of a combination of the NE/S/MW as far as hunting approaches go. Opinions?

[Bigburner]

I’m on the Delmarva and I would equate it to it’s own region. But if I had to generalize I’d say more like the south. Flat loblolly plantations bottomland hardwoods. Not easy to hunt due to thick cover and zero topography. Bedding in the big woods is really tough to figure out at first. Totally different approach to any other place I’ve hunted.
Where in NW PA are you from out of curiosity. My moms whole side of the family is from Elk County. Family still has two camps up there. Spent every summer as a kid up there. Love that place.

[1STRANGEWILDERNESS]

You are absolutely right, Good post.

I grew up hunting in mid Michigan AG country. Hunted a few other Midwest areas. I now live in the upper peninsula of Michigan and I do not feel like part of the Midwest. I don’t even find it comparable to lower MI hunting.
I think a lot of things would translate to lower MI but being as the pressure was so high there , almost all of my success on mature deer was based on patterning other hunters not seeking out specific habitat. It was more seeking out what was left over or “overlooked” A friend let me hunt his property one time in the mid 2000’s. I knew it was a honey hole and knew where all their blinds were. I was always “mobile” so I took a climber in there blind and hunted on a swamp edge about 150 yds from his brothers blind. I stuck a nice 8 and seen a bigger buck. This was a one time deal so I couldn’t pass the 8. I don’t think I was in his woods an hr. He couldn’t believe it. At the end of the day it wasn’t really woodsmanship. I just knew that was the heaviest cover in his land and that nobody hunted that area in the history they owned the land. So if I was a bigger buck that’s where I’d go.

In the big Northwoods i was humbled beyond belief. I have to really work to get on the deer(esp a good buck) there isn’t one in every parcel or two.. and things vary more from yr to yr. Pressure is a factor but not very often, other than the pressure I apply myself. It’s weird for me thinking of these bucks in ag land that you knew were in a 40 or even a few hundred acres. Maybe some surrounding fence lines or ditches held him. Now up north I have no idea what to think at times. Deer are commonly shot miles from where they were at the day or week before even when it’s not rut. This can happen anywhere but it’s the norm up here. One pro is I experience movement much earlier in the afternoons. Another is Deer aren’t as wise to hunters here. I don’t think I’ve been picked off in a tree up here yet (visually)

Since the first frost is often by mid September lots of forages are dead in early oct. when The first big cold front hits in early oct the movement can be insane. The “oct lull” time frame may well be my favorite time to hunt here. Also it’s common to have snow around Halloween or just after. That also changes things and brings some great action. Now as the rut gets going with our gun opener looming on nov 15 truck loads of feed get dropped all over the forest. Rifht around then I usually loose my marbles trying to figure out what’s going on. By December everyone is gone and it back to business as usual. I have found quite a few bucks dropping horns by mid December which sucks. Not all of em but last few yrs it was an awful lot.

Overall it’s a whole new set of challenges some things are easier some things are harder. I love the chase!

[elk yinzer]

I mostly hunt what can be considered the Appalachian Mountains and there are very few legitmate sources of info. A lot of great knowledge on here if you dig and search. Heck even within my localized hour or so radius there are a half dozen or more terrain types

[Brad]

I am in Missouri, and I have felt the same thing about most of the information being specific to regions other than my area. Then I realized the problem is in my general area we have a little bit of just about everything. If you go a little further south you start to get into mountains, further north is mostly all agriculture farm land, along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers is alot of river bottoms, big woods, and marsh, and there is everything in between... I mean, there is so much variety. You can take information learned from so many different sources and apply it to the various areas to hunt.

[Hawthorne]

I mostly hunt what can be considered the Appalachian Mountains and there are very few legitmate sources of info. A lot of great knowledge on here if you dig and search. Heck even within my localized hour or so radius there are a half dozen or more terrain types

Same in Michigan. Within an hour you can be in marsh, hills , swamp, or farmland. The hills are nothing like the hills of western Wisconsin or southern Ohio but hill bedding is there. Shot my biggest coming off a hill

[Archivist13]

I’m on the Delmarva and I would equate it to it’s own region. But if I had to generalize I’d say more like the south. Flat loblolly plantations bottomland hardwoods. Not easy to hunt due to thick cover and zero topography. Bedding in the big woods is really tough to figure out at first. Totally different approach to any other place I’ve hunted.
Where in NW PA are you from out of curiosity. My moms whole side of the family is from Elk County. Family still has two camps up there. Spent every summer as a kid up there. Love that place.

I'm from Warren, which is literally the county up north of Elk, so I know the area where. Yes, big woods bedding is really hard to figure out. Where I hunt along Allegheny River I can literally walk 10 or more miles in every direction without running into a single field or town. It is frustrating, but so much fun at the same time.

[Archivist13]

You are absolutely right, Good post.

I grew up hunting in mid Michigan AG country. Hunted a few other Midwest areas. I now live in the upper peninsula of Michigan and I do not feel like part of the Midwest. I don’t even find it comparable to lower MI hunting.
I think a lot of things would translate to lower MI but being as the pressure was so high there , almost all of my success on mature deer was based on patterning other hunters not seeking out specific habitat. It was more seeking out what was left over or “overlooked” A friend let me hunt his property one time in the mid 2000’s. I knew it was a honey hole and knew where all their blinds were. I was always “mobile” so I took a climber in there blind and hunted on a swamp edge about 150 yds from his brothers blind. I stuck a nice 8 and seen a bigger buck. This was a one time deal so I couldn’t pass the 8. I don’t think I was in his woods an hr. He couldn’t believe it. At the end of the day it wasn’t really woodsmanship. I just knew that was the heaviest cover in his land and that nobody hunted that area in the history they owned the land. So if I was a bigger buck that’s where I’d go.

In the big Northwoods i was humbled beyond belief. I have to really work to get on the deer(esp a good buck) there isn’t one in every parcel or two.. and things vary more from yr to yr. Pressure is a factor but not very often, other than the pressure I apply myself. It’s weird for me thinking of these bucks in ag land that you knew were in a 40 or even a few hundred acres. Maybe some surrounding fence lines or ditches held him. Now up north I have no idea what to think at times. Deer are commonly shot miles from where they were at the day or week before even when it’s not rut. This can happen anywhere but it’s the norm up here. One pro is I experience movement much earlier in the afternoons. Another is Deer aren’t as wise to hunters here. I don’t think I’ve been picked off in a tree up here yet (visually)

Since the first frost is often by mid September lots of forages are dead in early oct. when The first big cold front hits in early oct the movement can be insane. The “oct lull” time frame may well be my favorite time to hunt here. Also it’s common to have snow around Halloween or just after. That also changes things and brings some great action. Now as the rut gets going with our gun opener looming on nov 15 truck loads of feed get dropped all over the forest. Rifht around then I usually loose my marbles trying to figure out what’s going on. By December everyone is gone and it back to business as usual. I have found quite a few bucks dropping horns by mid December which sucks. Not all of em but last few yrs it was an awful lot.

Overall it’s a whole new set of challenges some things are easier some things are harder. I love the chase!

I love the chase too, which is why I have stuck with this sport for so long I suppose. I totally hear what your saying too. When I am hunting in the woods of PA I feel like it's a completely game than here in Maryland. Like you said, a deer could literally be miles away the following day. I have hunted mountains that one day every one in my camp will see absolutely nothing and it is obvious that there were no deer anywhere, and the next day you see a dozen moving through. Good luck figuring that out. Guess it's harder to write articles abou that type of hunting too. Haha!

[Archivist13]

I mostly hunt what can be considered the Appalachian Mountains and there are very few legitmate sources of info. A lot of great knowledge on here if you dig and search. Heck even within my localized hour or so radius there are a half dozen or more terrain types

Yes, if you dig, you can definitely find good resources. As I mentioned above, this type of hunting is much less patternable, so I guess it's not as sexy for the writers and shows to work on.

[Archivist13]

I am in Missouri, and I have felt the same thing about most of the information being specific to regions other than my area. Then I realized the problem is in my general area we have a little bit of just about everything. If you go a little further south you start to get into mountains, further north is mostly all agriculture farm land, along the Mississippi and Missouri rivers is alot of river bottoms, big woods, and marsh, and there is everything in between... I mean, there is so much variety. You can take information learned from so many different sources and apply it to the various areas to hunt.

I think that's actually what is so exciting about hunting here in Maryland. You have a little bit of everything so you can try to throw the kitchen sink at it. When I'm in the PA mountains it is literally hilly woods for miles in every direction.

[Archivist13]

I mostly hunt what can be considered the Appalachian Mountains and there are very few legitmate sources of info. A lot of great knowledge on here if you dig and search. Heck even within my localized hour or so radius there are a half dozen or more terrain types

Same in Michigan. Within an hour you can be in marsh, hills , swamp, or farmland. The hills are nothing like the hills of western Wisconsin or southern Ohio but hill bedding is there. Shot my biggest coming off a hill

The hills here in Maryland are laughable compared to what I hunt in PA. Yet, I do find similar patterns. It's on such a different scale that it easy to overlook.

[Carl Tuesday]

I'm just getting into hunting whitetails and even in my limited experience I've found the same thing (I'm also in south/central maryland), since a lot of what I read just doesn't seem to apply to the terrain I've found this far and is written for the Big Woods of Wisconsin, Michigan,etc.

Plus, and I don't have great context but the deer on public here seem plenty pressured - a lot of what I've read rarely if ever mentions other hunters or pressure.it just sort of seems to assume that away, like the tv shows.

[Archivist13]

I'm just getting into hunting whitetails and even in my limited experience I've found the same thing (I'm also in south/central maryland), since a lot of what I read just doesn't seem to apply to the terrain I've found this far and is written for the Big Woods of Wisconsin, Michigan,etc.

Plus, and I don't have great context but the deer on public here seem plenty pressured - a lot of what I've read rarely if ever mentions other hunters or pressure.it just sort of seems to assume that away, like the tv shows.

Yes, the whitetails are very heavily pressured down here in Maryland. It cracks me up when I read people say that they won't hunt a piece of public if they see another vehicle in the parking lot. I would never enter the woods to hunt if I followed that line of thinking. Lucky if you can even find an open parking lot! LOL You really have to hunt the hunter as well as the terrain features. It's hard to really get away from anyone due to the reasonably flat terrain here. I have run into just as many guys 2 miles deep as I have 100 yards from the road.

[Burningbootleather]

Hunting is the same in every area and you should not only do what the TV deer hunters and hunting gurus claim to be the correct method-you should also buy the products they sell because that’s what will make the difference

Okay okay we all know I’m lying. Hunting is very diverse. Deer are individuals. There are a plethora of different types of “hunting” and different methods people use to find success in each

[Archivist13]

Hunting is the same in every area and you should not only do what the TV deer hunters and hunting gurus claim to be the correct method-you should also buy the products they sell because that’s what will make the difference

Okay okay we all know I’m lying. Hunting is very diverse. Deer are individuals. There are a plethora of different types of “hunting” and different methods people use to find success in each

Exactly, which is part of why hunting is so much fun. A big puzzle, that only fits together by using other puzzle pieces.